On Body and Soul

Who would have thought that scenes of two deer, slowly moving through a snowy forest, could be so meaningful? Apart from being beautiful nature shots, there is a special meaning to them in this film, when it turns out that the two protagonists both dream of being a deer. That's the magic of cinema: to give images a deeper emotional meaning than they seem to have at first sight.

I loved everything about this film. The slightly bizarre story to begin with: two people discover that they're having the same dream every night. The way they discover this is priceless in itself. I also loved the two characters: both are slightly handicapped, one physically and the other one emotionally. Actress Alexandra Borbély is great, playing a girl with autistic spectrum disorder. And above all I loved the way the director takes her time to let the story develop: slowly but very deliberately, taking care of every small meaningful detail.

This is a very tender movie. The viewer can't help but sympathize with these two lonely people, both trying so hard to understand each other. It's making a great case for human dignity, mutual understanding and tolerance.

First things first: DO NOT WATCH THE TRAILERS they spoil the story.

And what a story it is! Slow, vulnerable, awkward, beautiful, painful. You can smell the sweat and blood and life.

The movie may be too intimate and fallible for some prople, though all those uneasy details add to the story and the feeling. It peaks in chatarsis multiple times during the movie, still the ending is a bit too obvious for my taste (especially when in contrasts to the previous 90 minutes as the movie cleverly and slowly evolved and expanded) Still this is a masterpiece: multilayered, well acted, well shot. Bruising yet uplifting. What more one may ask from a movie.

Update: initially I rated this 9/10 due to some nitpicking on technical issues like pacing at the end. After a week of haunting images, memories and feelings in its wake, I say this movie is the real deal: so here it is 10/10 (like M. Lazhar.)

Beautiful. Moving. Funny. Touching. Magical. Shocking. Wonderful. A film for grown-ups with hearts and minds. The direction - the shots, the camera-work, the framing - are a pleasure: one admires parts of the film as one does a painting. The acting is so natural as to forget one is not watching a real life scene. The script is elegant and sparse - there is so much left unsaid; it's the space between the words that count. The all encompassing vision makes one proud to be a human being.

Enyedi has made a beautiful love story weaving a little bit of magical realism into it. This felt like an introvert's fantasy realized on the screen. There were so many moments that could have gone wrong if tweaked a little bit to either side but they felt perfect here. With beautiful cinematography and great performances, this is one of the best romances of the year.

Snowfall in a forest of firs, gentle wind, the soothing sound of flowing water and two deer nuzzling in the mist. Endre and Maria are fastidious loners and mere acquaintances, yet they share this recurring dream. Though Maria has extreme difficulty with physical contact, she strives to overcome this limitation with her vivid imagination and immense desire. The mutual and expanding dreams tug at the pair, body and soul, but so do their fears, obsessions and predilections for solitude.

I loved the sensual nature of the film and the two main characters who delight in little things such as the warmth of sunlight and the brushing of hair with a hand. Close-up photography, of faces, reflections in the water and more, adds another layer of sensuality to the film. Both Endre and Maria work in a slaughterhouse and while the story does not dwell for too long in the raw bloodshed of this, it is enough to make you vow to become a vegetarian. I appreciate the film's slant on the subject, which Endre gives voice to in telling a candidate for a job at the slaughterhouse, "if you don't feel sorry for the cows, you can't work here." The character chemistry seems a little off, as Endre appears much older and uglier than Maria, but maybe it is just me. Seen at the Toronto International Film Festival.